


Love Like The Sea

by KittyHawke



Category: The Old Guard (Movie 2020)
Genre: Fluff and Angst, Headcanon, M/M, Pre-Canon, Short One Shot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-31
Updated: 2020-07-31
Packaged: 2021-03-06 00:34:39
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,411
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25634389
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KittyHawke/pseuds/KittyHawke
Summary: Nicky and Joe have a moment together during the search for Quyhn.
Relationships: Andy/Quyhn in the background, Joe | Yusuf Al-Kaysani/Nicky | Nicolò di Genova
Kudos: 124





	Love Like The Sea

**Author's Note:**

> I'm just interested in how Quyhn's drowning might have affected Joe and Nicky, so I wrote this small thing and I hope it's okay. Writing romantic stuff for these guys is fun!
> 
> Notes: Personal headcanon, Joe was the first to get a nickname, which is why he's called as such and the others still have their proper names. I believe Joe is a genuine nickname for Yusuf, whereas Andy and Nicky are more modernisations that don't come directly from their old names. It's only a small detail, but I thought I'd mention it. Also I totally made up Nicky's backstory. That is not meant to be accurate to any source material.
> 
> Title comes from the sea being beautiful, but also terrifying in how deep it goes, which sums up Nicky's feelings in this OS.

Their little family is fractured without Quyhn.

Hearing the tales of Lykon was bad enough, discovering for the first time that their immortality wasn’t perfect and having to cast a worried eye back on how often they had killed each other before coming to their senses, but it was nevertheless something they could control. They could watch out for each other more carefully and keep track of their deaths to ensure that one didn’t move too far ahead of the other. They told each other that Andromache and Quyhn were far older and that they may still have thousands of years ahead, and in that way, eased their fears.

They never thought to fear this. Even an immortal can be defeated and humans, endlessly inventive when it comes to harming others, figured out a way. The very atmosphere of the house seems to have grown cold and dark under the weight of grief and guilt. Andromache, their dear friend, is distraught and there is nothing they can do to help her. They were too late and the sea is so vast. Even with all the time afforded by immortality, finding Quyhn seems impossible. Nobody wants to say it out loud. They have been searching for months and they will keep searching until Andromache tells them to stop, not a moment before, no matter how hopeless it is.

He senses that it won’t be long now. It is so difficult for Andromache to be around them and see what she has lost. It is so difficult, too, for them to be around her and see what could so easily have been their fate. Below the grief for their sisters is gratitude that it wasn’t them, and the guilt for thinking that way is not strong enough to stop. Andromache is better than either of them. She is wounded, but unbroken, which is more than either of them could claim to be in her position.

“That must be the cleanest sword in the world by now.”

His mouth quirks slightly before settling back into a line. Even at the worst times Joe’s voice provides a small spot of warmth, but it feels wrong to smile. Catholic guilt demands atonement before he can be free to enjoy anything. He pauses his mindless polishing and looks down. He can see his reflection in the blade, looking tired and sickly. They are still trying to track down the people who were on the boat. Of the ones they have found, no-one will provide any information. They would rather be tortured to death than let her be rescued. Their commitment to hatred is remarkable.

He has considered stepping back from the search, trying again when feelings are not so high and witnesses are more willing to speak, but there are many reasons not to suggest the idea. Andromache would never hear of it. There is a chance for witnesses to die or disappear if they don’t keep tracking. Every minute that Quyhn remains underwater is another time that she drowns- God, the very thought makes him feel ill. If they run around the world like headless chickens for another fifty years, at least it will feel as if they are doing something.

“We failed Quyhn, but at least my sword is polished” he agrees.

“We did not fail her” Joe says, sitting down beside him.

“We should have done more.”

“No,” Joe hugs him, his beard scratching Nicolo’s cheek as they lean their heads together. “We did all we could.”

They didn’t. Nicolo has been replaying everything in his mind for hours, picking out every small detail that could have saved precious time. If they had ridden through the night just one more time, if they had gone without food for longer, if they had even put on a sprint for ten minutes, it could have made a difference.

“Do you think we will find her?” he asks quietly.

Joe pauses and then sighs. “No.”

“Would you keep looking, if it was me?”

Joe holds him closer and kisses the top of his head. “I would never stop. My life would have no other purpose.”

“I thought we were lucky.”

“We are.”

He’s less sure of that right now. The depth of his feeling for Joe still has the ability to alarm him at times. He never wanted to feel like this. After seeing how the deaths of his baby siblings broke his parents’ hearts, he hoped that devotion to God would protect him from earthly affection, save him from having his heart ripped open by loss. God heard his prayers and gifted him with a love who could not be torn away by time and death. He has sent his gratitude in prayers night after night, but he has still suffered for loving Yusuf, and now there is this cruel new reality to contend with. They can still be separated without even the hope of an afterlife to reunite them. Every blessing has its curse.

“Is it better to be lonely and safe, or to love people and risk losing them?” he asks.

“You will never lose me.”

“It could have been us, Joe.”

“Habibi,” Joe whispers into his ear. He sounds desperately sad and Nicolo regrets speaking. He doesn’t want to hurt his love, not even with ideas. “Amore mio, you cannot think like this or you will go mad. It was not us. What happened was a tragedy. It was not our fault, it was not Andromache’s. The only ones to blame are the ones who drowned her and they will pay for it. We still have each other and we always will, I swear.”

Nicolo turns and hugs him, pressing his face into Joe’s neck. He doesn’t have his love’s ability to create poems out of thin air. Many times he struggles even to offer a simple phrase. They are all so inadequate to express how he feels. _I love you. I need you. I can’t stand to be apart from you._ Joe knows all of this and Nicolo says it anyway, many times, because his love values words and he can never get enough of the awestruck look in those dear brown eyes.

It’s not enough right now, not for this. He tries to summon up one of those carefully crafted declarations that Joe is so talented at. “You are everything to me,” He speaks the words into Joe’s skin. “You are the sun and I orbit you, and without you I would be nothing.”

Joe crushes him in a hug, and pulls back only to hold his face and kiss him. “And you are my stars,” he says fervently. “My guiding light that I will follow blindly for all my days. I am going nowhere without you.”

He smiles. He can’t help it. Joe has always been better at this. Had he known how frequent these grand statements were going to be, he might have been less impressed by the first, but then again 500 years have passed and Joe still has the ability to make his heart thump with adoration. He presses their foreheads together and breathes him in.

“Andromache will ask us to leave soon. I can sense it. She needs time away from us.”

“I agree,” Joe murmurs. “We will stay until then to help her.”

“I hate to think of her being alone.”

“Andromache is the strongest of us. Give her time. We will not be apart forever.”

Nicolo holds onto that hope and sends up a prayer. For Quyhn, that by some miracle she can be found. For Andromache, that she can heal from this heartbreak. For himself and Joe, that they might never be separated in such a way. And for their makeshift family unit as a whole, that they might find peace and recover the love and light that has been lost.

“I miss her” he says.

“As do I,” Joe sighs. “We can keep searching apart. It might help us to cover more water.”

He chooses to believe it’s possible. It might take a little time or a long time, but he holds onto the hope that history will eventually come full circle and they will be happy. Every curse has its blessing and if he must accept that everything will inevitably be lost, then surely that extends to the bad as well as the good. They will get there. The one blessing that an immortal has in spades, after all, is patience.

**Author's Note:**

> I hope you enjoyed reading this little thing and if you did, please kudos and comment. Thank you.


End file.
